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I have some equipment... now what?


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Equipment I currently own:

Roland Fantom X8

Roland VS-2480

Mics and Cables (various)

A nice computer plenty capable of running softsynths and recording software.

Drums, guitar, bass.

Now, I want to start doing remixes of my favorite games. What software is beneficial for the creation of techno/trance type songs? I'm talking about having programmed drums that I don't have to play using the pads on my Fantom X8. I can get ahold of any computer software that will help me. Thank you for any help with my noobish question. Any other tips on starting out remixing would be great!

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Thank you for the resources!!! I will look in to those when I have a free moment!

What is everyone's opinion on Sony Acid? I have Acid 6 but have not had much time to play around with it. (Just got it.) Can I take basslines that I played on my Fantom X8 and record them in to Acid and them have them automatically turned in to a loop? I really wish I could read a complete walkthrough on the most efficient way to construct a trance/dance track.

All of my experience is with playing real instruments and laying them down on the Roland. But, with this kind of music loops are sometimes necessary.

I have created ONE trance/dance track but it was created in a really poor way. I essentially lined up basslines and drums that I programmed on the Roland's built in drum sequencer by ear in Sony Vegas. Needless to say the metronome in Vegas and the metronome in the Fantom X8 are NOT perfectly calibrated and timing issues became a problem... :x

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Acid 6 is a fine program, but once again, I don't think you can beat FL6 for fast and easy loop manipulation and creation (it can do a whole lot more than that, of course).

Honestly, your best bet for learning how to create a dance/trance track is to simply analyze songs you like and break them down into their component elements. What's the time signature? Tempo? How many elements (eg. instruments) are going on at each point in the song? What's the form of the song (eg. Intro -> Buildup -> Chorus -> Breakdown -> Chorus -> Outtro)? How about the chord progression? All of these questions are important, and if you have at least a functioning ear, you should be able to answer them with any variety of electronic songs.

Once you've analyzed some songs, work off that. Try to recreate drum patterns you like part by part using a sequencer like FL. Use internal or external effects like EQ, compression, reverb, and delay to further approximate a particular sound. Search on Google for technical interviews with your favorite artists - many electronic artists love talking about the methods that they use to create their music, and are more than happy to tell a magazine or website how they achieve a particular sound, or how they approach creating their songs.

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If you wanna record all that hardware you've got, Sonar and Cubase both have excellent audio recording and great midi support [for your software stuff]. They're a lot more pricy than FL Studio, but... at least they can record audio. FL kinda sucks at it. There are different versions of the software available for different prices, though I'm not sure how cheap they'll go.

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There is only one way to find out if you like the workflow of a program, and that is to use it! So reccomend going forth and getting as many demos as you can - FL has a free demo, that lets you do anything but save the file ^_^ I know other programs have demos as well, but I'm not sure what the restrictions on those demos are.

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If you've never used software to make music before, it will take you a good while before you start to "get" the programs and workflow, especially with programs like Sonar and Cubase. But don't get discouraged by that, unless you absolutely hate the interface of a given program, try to persevere until you start to have some idea of how it all functions. After you know one such program fairly well, getting into other programs will be much easier as well, as they usually have some similar features. The concept and functionality of plug ins (inserts and sends) and midi sequencers are two examples.

Sorry if this is all obvious to you, it wasn't crystal clear how much experience you do have with Acid for example. :)

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You probably won't need that Fantom X 8. You should just send it to me, so I can get rid of it for you.

You wish... :-)

Well I checked out a demo of Fruity Loops and I am more than impressed. How can I integrate my Hardware based synths like the X8 and the various softsynths I have as well in to this program and use them in songs?

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1) You need something to record the Fantom's audio with (e.g. soundcard, but preferably one geared towards music production). One with digital I/O would be nice; noiseless recording.

2) You need something to record the Fantom's MIDI with (e.g. USB MIDI interface, but it looks ike the Fantom already has that covered).

3) You need to assign the Fantom's knobs to those of your softsynths in FL Studio. Alternatively, you can get an extra controller with just knobs because the Fantom already gives you the keyboard part of the equation.

4) Install the Fantom's editor if you haven't done so yet.

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1) You need something to record the Fantom's audio with (e.g. soundcard, but preferably one geared towards music production). One with digital I/O would be nice; noiseless recording.

2) You need something to record the Fantom's MIDI with (e.g. USB MIDI interface, but it looks ike the Fantom already has that covered).

3) You need to assign the Fantom's knobs to those of your softsynths in FL Studio. Alternatively, you can get an extra controller with just knobs because the Fantom already gives you the keyboard part of the equation.

4) Install the Fantom's editor if you haven't done so yet.

I already have done all that, but I wasn't sure if I could, for example, record a synth pattern played with the X8's internal sounds and convert that pattern in to a loop that I could use with FL.

Alternatively, would it be best for me to get comfortable with programming my parts in FL?

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I recommend Cakewalk Project5. Does midi programming very well (including drum programming) does audio recording pretty well, does soft synths well, comes with some very nice synths out of the box, is very cheap ($199), and a free large update (version 2.5) is coming in a couple months. I honestly think P5 is the ultimate learning software that one would probably stick with for a long time due to its ease of use, relatively well rounded package of included stuff, and price. I've used Sonar, Reason, Ableton Live, ACID, all a lot, and FL studio a little (poo poo 'playlist' sequencing not for me).

About ACID - depends what ACID 6 you are using. There is a big difference between ACID music studio 6 and ACID Pro 6. If you have Pro 6, you're probably pretty set, as it does midi in, out, audio recording, vsti, and all that. The version of kompakt it comes with is pretty nice too with a bunch of sounds.

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I use Sonar and I love it, especially 6.o, but I decided not to reccomend it because it has a huge learning curve, while FLStudio and Reason ease people in much better.However, if you think you're up for the challenge, anything you want to do and Sonar can probably do it, it supports most plug-in formats (including DXi and VST), has some quality synths built in (PSYN II is pretty nice but the Pentagon I is very sweet, but more expensive synths like the Korg Legacy Edition or Absynth or z3ta+ or something are better), and has some amazing plug-ins and effects, like V-Vocal (think autotune only better, everything from pitch-correction, to time stretching, to vibrato adjustment, and the ability to creae tons of neat effects. Go to

to see what I mean), Perfect Space (great reverb plug-in made by Voxengo who is a quality effects company), and the VC-64 (Vintage compresser and EQ with tons of extra options, its very high quality and is made by kjaerhus, another great company). Point is, get Cakewalk and you'll be thrown straight into an ocean, however master it and you'll be able to do almost anything you want to.
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I must disagree, Nicole. I really, really tried to get into reason's drum programming... but I couldn't. Fruity's is just much, much faster. Yeah, reason is very easy to pick up, particularly if you are familar with hardware drum stuff, but Fruity's step sequencer is just way, way, way faster and more versitile once you get the hang of it. Not that getting the hang of it takes very long.

I suppose this could be nothing but my personal opinion, so again, demo everything!

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Splunke, did you try to program drums in Redrum's sequencer or the main sequencing window? When I first started using Reason I arranged my drums in the main sequencing window, which I hated. I switched to using Redrum's and suddenly made drum parts quicker that were much better. It's all just a matter of preference, anyway. I myself never enjoyed FL Studio for drum programming and actually don't find the entire program to be very motivating. That's just me, though. :wink:

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When I first started using Reason I arranged my drums in the main sequencing window, which I hated. I switched to using Redrum's and suddenly made drum parts quicker that were much better.

Heh, for me it's the exact opposite! :) I hate seeing the sequencing for only one sample at a time and having to toggle between channels, with no possibility for non-quantized notes. To me, the sequencer is so much easier and quicker, as long as it's in the drum lane view, so you can only see piano roll "notes" corresponding to the ReDrum channels, labeled with the sample filenames. Using the regular piano roll is annoying though.

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I tried both. I found the sequencer less irritating, because I could at least see all the samples I was playing around with. With Redrum I kept on having to switch back and go "arrrrgghhh, when did I have those hats playing" and so forth.

I suppose this illustrates that when I'm doing drums, I really need to have all the samples I'm using in front of me. Which is a great reason why fruity is awesome. Plus the inbuilt swing thing is really handy, though I think Sonar/Cubase/Logic do jazz too.

The one thing I wish fruity did was to change the colour of the note in the step sequencer depending on the velocity. ReDrum had three colours, one each for soft, medium and hard hits. Thats the only thing I wish fruity would do, actually. Just make it a little easier to tell what velocity a note is without having to bust out that mini-editor thing.

So in conclusion, since Nicole actually prefers drumming is reason, which I admit I am somewhat amazed with, this just shows that you should demo everything in your price range!

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I do, when I'm using Reason for drums (been using Live and it's Impulse a lot recently). In Reason, usually I'll just sketch something out real quick on the redrum (like extremely basic) then send the pattern to track and work from there in the sequencer.

But Reason (and now Live6 has this feature) own everything else because you can hot-swap samples. So you can let your pattern loop and just go through the browser clicking on samples which will be autoloaded into a pad temporarily. It lets you hear what a sample will sound like in the pattern with one click. I don't know of any other drum samplers that do that. I spend more time on sound design/sample choice than the actual sequencing usually so this is more important to me than quick pattern editing that something else might offer (I like Live's pattern editing a lot though).

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You can always clone the original sample you were using, which retains all of its routing and channel settings, so you don't lose it. The effect is the same. I insist that nothing is faster for drum programming than FL ;)

But let's agree to disagree. We've had this discussion enough that I doubt we'll convince anyone, or each other.

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We've had this discussion enough that I doubt we'll convince anyone
SGX has completely convinced me that Reason is the far superior program...that and I use Reason for pretty much everything. It's a night little toolbox for people who just want to pump out jams and don't have the real life stuff, and I just love the way it works.

But yea, Cubase & Sonar seem like a good bet to me for recording

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